Volunteer garbage pickers keep Victoria Falls clean

Leonard Ncube, Victoria Falls Reporter
THE Victoria Falls waste management taskforce that was formed by various stakeholders to keep the resort city clean has been picking litter daily from the streets since October last year and so far over 25 000 bags of garbage have been collected.

The clean-up initiative seeks to maintain Victoria Falls in its pristine state.

There are however, concerns about litterbugs that continue to dump garbage on the streets and illegal dumping sites.

Victoria Falls is a resort destination and keeping the streets and environment clean is a top priority as part of the green tourism initiative.

Litter is also dangerous to wildlife as elephants have died after eating indigestible plastic.

The Victoria Falls waste management taskforce is part of the Pristine Victoria Falls Society Initiative (PVFSI) which was started in October last year.

Organisations or individuals adopt a certain part of the city to clean on a daily basis.

PVFSI was formed by stakeholders and residents to work towards transforming Victoria Falls into the cleanest city in Africa.
Led by a committee of individuals from various organisations within Victoria Falls, the PVFSI has grown tremendously as more stakeholders and individuals take the pledge to ensure Victoria Falls is kept in its pristine state.

On the other hand, the Victoria Falls waste management taskforce is composed of the PVFSI, Environmental Management Authority (EMA), Victoria Falls City Council and police.

The taskforce has become an important participant in the National Clean-up exercise that was started up by President Mnangagwa for people to clean their surroundings on the first Friday of each month.

Its manager Mr Douglas Musiringofa said close to 200 tickets have been issued to litterbugs in the past six months.

He said illegal dumping is rampant in high density suburbs and along main roads.

“The PVFSI has in the last 6 months collected over 25 000 litter bags off Vic Falls streets amounting to over 6 tonnes of waste.

“This work has been through collaboration with various stakeholders through our membership composed of all major tourism players,” said Mr Musiringofa.

He said February 2023 was the most active month in terms of members engagement during the national clean-up day which saw over 50 member organisations and over 1 500 people participating.

Mr Musiringofa said continuous awareness has led to improved attitude as littering has reduced significantly at some garbage hotspots such as at Comesa market better known as Emaplankeni and Mukali Shopping Centre.

He said a daily cleaning routine is good for tourism because of high human and vehicular traffic.

“Morale enforcement remains a significant part of PVFS operations in which over 170 tickets have been issued in the last 6 months. About 90 percent of the tickets were successfully paid for and offenses varied from dumping litter illegally to non-compliance to environmental policies of the city for business operations,” he said.

“Currently, our biggest challenge is still dumping and our assessment through a survey conducted in February 2023 showed that dumping is rampant in the high density areas due to quicker accumulation of waste caused by crowding.

“Our intention is to erect cages in strategic areas starting with key problem areas to encourage residents to drop waste in these cages when their bins fill up. This will not only reduce levels of dumping but will further reduce maintenance costs for the refuse trucks as well as amount of fuels burnt collecting the waste.”

Refuse trucks collect litter once a week in high density suburbs and twice in low density areas.

Mr Musiringofa said there was serious dumping of litter during the just ended Easter holiday especially along the airport road.

“My message to people is that we should remember what makes Victoria Falls tick, the natural environment and the magnificent rainforest. So we need to maintain it pristine as much as possible. It’s time we learnt that we’re not doing it for anyone but ourselves because improper waste management affects us. We ought to have civic pride and appreciate our city more than anyone else,” he said.–@ncubeleon